“Hay-haw,” they all answered.
Smoke Shield took their measure, seeing the gleam in their eyes. Yes, they are keen now, but will they be as committed when we are sneaking through a dark and hostile forest?
“When you have taken their high minko and this Screaming Falcon, make your way to the canoe landing. Steal whatever craft you need, and set the rest adrift. The White Arrow will have no trail to follow when they finally gather their wits. Before they are organized, you will be downriver, and most of the way home.”
Each of the men was nodding.
Flying Hawk touched his breast. “I know that sometimes, late at night, you will hesitate, wondering if you made the right decision. No one lives forever, and should anyone die, he will have his souls avenged. You need not return to Split Sky City to know this. You will hear the screams of the captives from far beyond the walls.”
Sobered, the men nodded, glancing at each other in reassurance.
“The Sky Hand People have never been as proud of our warriors as we are of you at this moment.” Flying Hawk bent down, taking the last puff from the war pipe. Exhaling the smoke through his mouth and nostrils, he said, “Let us go now. A great feast has been prepared. Let our people adore you, and as you feast, look into their eyes, see their gratitude, and keep that memory next to your hearts as you do this great thing.”
Smoke Shield clapped each of his men on the back as they stepped out into the fresh air. He could hear the cries of joy as his people met their heroes.
“You made a good speech,” Smoke Shield said as he lifted the war medicine and ran his arms through the straps.
“You just make a good raid,” Flying Hawk replied, worry in his eyes.
Heron Wing clapped her hands, raising her voice along with others as the warriors trotted grandly out of the plaza; through the maze of houses, granaries, and workshops; and down to the canoe landing northwest of the Skunk Clan grounds. There, among the multitude, she watched Smoke Shield and his warriors clamber into their canoes. They pushed off and began paddling downriver, heads up, looking for all the world as if they had already won.
“Will he come back?” Violet Bead asked from beside her.
Heron Wing grunted. “Would we care if he didn’t?”
“I’m not looking forward to having my hair cut, howling in the night, and acting like a widow.”
Heron Wing shrugged. “But for the cut hair and howling, what would be the difference?”
“Not much.” Violet Bead turned; she was a tall woman, attractive, with long glistening hair. Her two children, girls of three and four, stood beside her. Having seen twenty-one summers, Violet Bead was five years younger than Heron Wing. Smoke Shield had been smitten with the woman’s beauty the first time he’d seen her, and had pressed Flying Hawk to arrange a hasty marriage. Violet Bead’s people were weavers, their lineage of little status and less authority among the Crawfish Clan. But then, what Smoke Shield wanted, he always got. In the case of Violet Bead it had taken several years before he tired of her.
She did better than I at holding his interest. The thought came unbidden. What did she care? She glanced back at her son, now eight. He was playing in the dirt, drawing in the soot-stained soil among bits of shell left by the shell carvers. He liked to draw, but as Pale Cat’s nephew, he would be directed toward the arts of a Healer. She had already had talks with her brother about what to do if Healing didn’t mesh well with the boy’s creative spirit. At least he was nothing like his father.
She absently reached up, fingers tracing the faint scar on her cheek. Smoke Shield had given her that after a particularly bitter argument. In truth, she didn’t mind him bedding the slave women and frolicking with the prostitutes, but he didn’t have to be so rotted blatant about it. As far as she was concerned, if he was driving himself into the slaves, prostitutes, and several other men’s wives, he wasn’t crawling into her bed. It was bad enough on those rare occasions when he felt compelled to. People had begun to talk about how for eight years he hadn’t planted his seed in her sheath.
There are advantages to having a Hopaye for a brother. Pale Cat gave her the necessary herbs and had instructed her on how to irrigate her sheath to avoid pregnancy. She had told him it was for one of her friends on whose behalf she’d asked; nevertheless, he probably suspected. Pale Cat, however, held no great fondness for Smoke Shield, either.
“Have you thought about asking him to divorce you?” Violet Bead asked dryly.
“Is it that obvious?”
Like most co-wives, they had never been particularly close, but they tolerated each other better than most.